Using HubPages to Build Visibility As a Resume Writer

How to Build a Successful HubPages Link 
HubPages are essentially hosted web pages. As a "Hubber" you write and publish pages. These pages are essentially articles or long pages of content on a specific topic. For example, you might write a page on how to cultivate your job search network.

HubPages are great tools for building your visibility as a resume writer -- they are well-indexed using Google -- and you can also make money from your content. (Signing up for HubPages is free.)

The key to success on HubPages is to write great content. How do you know if it is great content? Well, HubPages has measures in place. These measures include the ability for readers to:

* Tweet
* Like
* Vote up
* Vote down
* Share
* Print
* Follow

Many of these elements contribute to what's called "hub karma." You essentially earn points for quality content. As your points increase, so too does your linking power.

The HubPages Linking Tool
HubPages offers a very useful linking tool. This tool gives you suggestions to the best hubs to link to. Link to other hubs and you boost your hub karma. Additionally, this linking strategy can also motivate others to link back to you. Thus, linking can generate traffic and ultimately it can help boost your HubPages profits.

When choosing to link to other hubs, keep your readers and audience in mind. Only link to other hubs that are relevant and valuable. For example, if you have a hub page about interviewing, linking to a hub that talks about how to change your car's oil filter just doesn't make sense. It's not relevant or helpful to your reader. However, a link to a hub page about career assessments would be relevant and helpful.

What About Back Linking? 
Many people use HubPages to link to their existing businesses. They use it, or try to use it, as a promotional tool. HubPages has very strict rules about self-promotion and will penalize you if you're simply using your hub to promote another site.

However, you can use other sites to promote your hub page. For example, you can link to your hub page from your Facebook or Twitter account. You can also link to your hub from your blog or website content. Again, like any incoming links, the more relevant they are to the topic being discussed, the better. And search engines love relevant links. When a hub page has many incoming links from other sites, it ranks better on Google. That means more people see your hub page and you make more money.

In fact, social networking is an integral part of HubPages. Every reader has the opportunity to like your content on Facebook and tweet or share. You can build a community of followers on both social networking sites and HubPages, and generate positive linking karma for more traffic and more profits.

Making Money From Your Hubpages
There are four main ways to monetize ("make money from") your HubPages. The first is through Google AdSense. When readers click on the ads on your HubPage, your Google AdSense account is credited. Don't have an AdSense account? It's easy to sign up. (And you can place AdSense ads on your other content pages -- for example your website or blog. Just be mindful that if you don't change your AdSense settings, you're going to be advertising a lot of other resume writing services on your blog or HubPage!)

The second way to make money from visitors to your HubPage is through integrating Ebay and Amazon modules into your page. Because most careers industry professionals won't be promoting products on their HubPages (in the same way someone writing about collecting Star Wars toys would, for example), your best bet is the Amazon module. You can recommend relevant careers industry books, and when someone buys from your link, your Amazon Associates affiliate account will be credited. (Personally, the most I've ever earned in a month from Amazon was around $5, but my sites don't get a lot of general jobseeker traffic either.)

The third way to make money from your HubPage is through affiliate marketing services. You can sign up for affiliate programs (for interview training services or career assessments or other job search-related products) and you'll make a commission whenever someone purchases one of these products using your affiliate link. (If you want to learn more about this, visit the "Expert Interviews" section on BeAResumeWriter.com (available to Bronze members) and download the recording and transcript of my teleseminar, "Building Affiliate Relationships to Grow Your Resume Business." (In this 63 minute program, you'll learn the five things you need to make affiliate relationships work, how to find and establish affiliate relationships, what products and services NOT to sell, and how much you can realistically earn from affiliate relationships.)

The fourth way is to get readers to purchase your career industry services! Including your contact information on your HubPage is a great way to allow your HubPage reader to turn into a real business customer!

Opportunity To Stake Your Claim
There aren't too many resume writers using HubPages yet -- these are two I found:
Patty Inglish
Marye Audet

HubPages are another tool you can use to build your prospect's ability to "know, like, and trust" you. Give it a try!

Are You A Top Performer In Our Industry?

I was just listening to a teleseminar featuring Mike Brooks (which is my father-in-law's name, but this particular Mike Brooks is not my husband's dad) on the topic of "Selling Secrets of a Top 20% Producer." The audience for this teleseminar was financial services professionals, but I wanted to share a couple of tips with my audience on this blog, my fellow career services professionals.

The first tip that he gave is actually the one that inspired Resume Writers Digest back in 1999:
"Study what the top producers in your industry do -- and then do those things."

When I started the Resume Writers' Digest newsletter more than 10 years ago, it was because I had questions about how to manage my resume writing business -- and be more effective in the work I do with clients -- and I wanted to learn from the best in the business. Over the years, that has included information from the likes of Wendy Enelow, Louise Kursmark, Jan Melnik, Susan Whitcomb, Janice Worthington, Alesia Benedict, Jay Block, Don Orlando, and literally hundreds of other resume writers who have shared their best practices, ideas, and strategies in articles, blog posts, teleseminars, and at conferences.

Brooks' second tip is "Be prepared to work hard AND smart."
This is a given for those of us in the career services industry. There are definitely ways to work "smarter" in this industry -- like choosing a niche (so you're not constantly having to learn new industries as you serve more and more clients), developing worksheets and other information-gathering devices (that you can either have clients work with directly, or that you use to guide your information collection efforts), and tying back into principal number one, learning from others in our industry.

He also recommends you "know your numbers" -- that is, tracking your activity and progress each day. For resume writers, this can be tracking a couple of metrics:
1) Number of calls/inquiries/quotes each day
2) Number of new projects booked each day
3) Dollar volume of projects completed daily
4) Daily expenses related to the operation of your business
5) Amount of time it took you to write the daily projects

But it was this piece of advice that struck me as the most useful for resume writers:
"Leads never get better; they only get worse."

Many of us resume writers are "social workers at heart" -- meaning, we look at helping our clients as a service more than as a business (sometimes to our own detriment). So how many times have you answered the call from a prospective client who had a sob story to tell (recently unemployed with a wife and four kids to support, or has been out of work for six months and has run out of money, or just graduated from college with $35,000 in student loans and no job prospects) -- and they want us to help them for free, or a reduced price. I've had my share of these calls. And while you can certainly help these folks (and I've helped some myself), it's important to remember that people need to invest in themselves. If they don't, they won't value the advice you give them, or be as motivated to make it work.

Even if they're not a sob story, you'll find yourself struggling with some prospective clients initially ... but you won't trust your gut about whether or not they're a good fit for working with you. Top performers understand that it it in THEIR best interest -- and their CLIENT'S best interest -- to work with the clients they have the best chance of helping be successful. These are clients who need your service, can afford your fees, and will commit to making the most out of working with you.

In their desperation to get business, many resume writers (me included, at times!) will hope that any possible "red flags" they encounter when talking with a prospective client will miraculously "go away" once the prospect commits to working with them. But what bothers you about a client in the beginning will always become a problem in the end.

• The client who asks for a discount will be the ones that take the most time. Or if they don't take the most time, they materialize as a "Pain In the A$$" (PIA) client in another way -- requesting endless revisions, or second-guessing your work by showing it to everyone and anyone they know in the hopes of getting the magical feedback that will make the resume "work" for them. (Never mind what you've already told them -- if Aunt Susan says the resume needs an objective, then they want an objective on there!)  These are the folks who don't invest in themselves (in their professional development or their job search) and consequently, they second-guess everything, and because they don't believe in themselves, they often don't believe others, either.

• The wife who calls for the husband because he's "too busy" but she promises you'll get to talk to him once you start on the project, that he'll "make time" ... but that never happens. I've had this happen to me a couple of times, and I've developed a personal rule that I will only work with clients who call me directly -- not spouses or parents. It's fine if the parent or spouse wants to pay, but I'm not going through a third party to figure out the job objective or write the resume.

• The client who doesn't know "what they want to be when they grow up" -- this often materializes as a phone conversation that goes something like this. Me: "So, what kind of position are you targeting?" Prospect: "I don't really have a particular job in mind. I just need a resume." Me: "Okay, but in order for your resume to be effective, you have to help the prospective employer understand how you will perform in that specific job." Prospect: "If they hire me, I'll show them I'll do a great job." Me: (silently) Ugh. 

Don't ignore the red flags! As Mike Brooks says, "Do what the top 20% do. As soon as you hear something that triggers your intuition or that gives you that sick feeling in your gut, stop and ask the tough qualifying questions."

Taking the advice in this blog post will help lead you closer to being one of the top performers in the career services industry.

"Getting Started With LinkedIn In Your Job Search"

For the past month, a good deal of my time was consumed developing the November Pass-Along Materials content pack -- a special report on "Getting Started with LinkedIn In Your Job Search." This 41-page guide enables resume writers and career coaches to brand (put their name on) a step-by-step user guide for clients to help them set up their LinkedIn profile.

LinkedIn currently has more than 120 million members, and they are adding new members at the rate of two new profiles per second. That's amazing.

You may be asked this question by job seekers: "Why do I need a LinkedIn account in addition to a Facebook profile?" As LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner put it in an Oct. 4 interview with Charlie Rose, "Why do you need an office when you have a house? Or why do you need a suit when you have sweat clothes?"

LinkedIn's purpose is "Connecting talent with opportunity on a massive scale," said company co-founder Reid Hoffman in the Rose interview. What else is a job search except "connecting talent" (your client) with opportunity (the ideal job)?



As resume writers, we know our clients should be on LinkedIn. But we also know that the majority of them don't know how to get on there -- or what to do once they are! (Have you read Jason Alba's excellent book, "I'm On LinkedIn, Now What?" If not, you should!)

Having a step-by-step guide for clients to help them develop and enhance their LinkedIn profile can be a valuable resource. You can provide it as an incentive to sign up for your mailing list. (I just recently uploaded a bonus -- 35 tweets you can use to promote your free LinkedIn report.) You can edit it to remove the very basic sign-up information and leave the information about importing contacts, joining Groups, participating in Answers, and following Companies and give it to clients who have purchased your LinkedIn profile development or enhancement services. You can use the report as a script and handout for a LinkedIn workshop, teleseminar, or webinar -- it's a great "getting started" guide. Or you can break it apart and use it on your blog in a series of articles on how to build your network on LinkedIn.

The "Getting Started With LinkedIn In Your Job Search" guide will only be available until Dec. 5 in the BeAResumeWriter.com Paid Member Resources section. After that date, I'll make it available for sale on Resume Writers' Digest's Store, but the cost will be substantially more than the $10 you'll pay to get it now on BeAResumeWriter.com. (Plus, your $10 also gets you access to "Resume Writer's Online Marketing Guidebook: A 21-Step Guide to Taking Your Resume Business Offline to Online," which retails for $14 itself on the Resume Writers' Digest store. You'll also get access to the complete back issue archive of Resume Writers' Digest, Expert Interview recordings and transcripts, and much more.)

How to Select The Best Clients To Work With

All too often, I talk to resume writers who are struggling with getting clients. My top advice for every resume writer is to establish a niche and become known as a specialist -- you're actually more likely to get more business by being a specialist than a generalist. (And yes, your niche doesn't have to be limited to a specific industry -- it can be geographic specialization, or specializing in career changes, or being an expert in return-to-work jobseekers.)

As a resume writer, you'll likely have moments when you wish you had turned down a client. Sometimes it's difficult to know if a client is right for you. Being able to choose the clients best suited to work with you ensures you have a more successful business. It makes sense -- yet resume writers get into trouble when they don't know themselves well enough, or they don't trust their gut.

Here's some strategies to help ensure you're picking the best clients to work with.

Know Your Strengths
Sometimes a client project doesn't go well simply because it's not suited to your strengths. For me, that's working with military transition clients, and IT professionals. Believe me, I can write for both types of clients -- but I don't like to, and that's the big difference. When you're writing for a type of client you don't enjoy, the project will likely be a constant challenge. You'll work harder and longer to complete it and end up essentially lowering your hourly value. Yet when you work on a project that speaks to your strengths, you finish on time, the client is happy, and you earn a loyal customer. (I love writing sales and marketing resumes, for example. They energize me, and I have hit quite a few "home runs" writing these types of documents for clients.)

When you're writing for clients in industries that are difficult for you, your work is a struggle. Clients that suit your strengths don't adversely affect your morale. You're able to maintain a positive mindset. This is key for long-term success.

Know What Your Ideal Client/Project Looks Like
Write down what your ideal clients and projects look like. What makes them good projects or clients?
For example, do you prefer working with specific industries? With individuals at a particular level of the job search -- i.e., entry-level vs. C-level? For those who are staying in the same industry, or career change? For those who are employed and looking for a better job, vs. those who have been unemployed for a while? (I don't know many resume writers who enjoy writing for chronically unemployed folks. It's a tough gig.)

As for projects, do you prefer writing just resumes, or do you like also writing the supporting job search documents -- cover letters, thank-you letters, letters of introduction? Do you enjoy helping clients develop or enhance their LinkedIn profile? What other services do you like to provide -- career assessments (DISC?), interview training, salary negotiation coaching? Do you like writing resumes from scratch vs. doing updates?

Make a list or create a paragraph description of what types of projects you like and perform well on. Then, when you have a choice to take a job or to pass, you can refer to your list to help you decide.

Take a Look at Your Schedule
Sometimes it's easy to say yes to a job even when you don't have the time to get it done properly. The result is that you either get very stressed and feel burnt out, or you complete the project but it's not your best work. Make sure you have the time and energy to complete any project you commit to. It can be difficult to say no to a project, especially when you want to earn clients; however, saying no may be the better decision. (Consider partnering with other resume writers and making referrals for projects that aren't a good fit. A 15% referral fee is standard in these arrangements.)

As a resume writer, it often takes time and some few hard-learned lessons to learn which jobs are the best ones to take and which to pass on. Don's hesitate to say no. All clients are not good clients. You'll find the right ones. You'll find great clients. You'll learn to identify the PIA (pain-in-the-a$$) clients. I've learned a couple of things that are my signals for a bad client -- like a wife calling on behalf of her husband. That may work for you, but I've found those clients are a bad fit for me.

Work hard, know what you want from clients, and select the best clients for you to work with.